DIY. Whose speakers would you use?

Tim, I made the same assumption. It seems, I think, that all the op wants to say is that all things being equal there is still a lot of work beyond the engineering. Well, yeah. Obviously. :-) This is true of all things audio, if the goal is better sound. If the goal is a price point, going no further than crunching numbers is fine. Electronics, speakers, DACS, tonearms, etc. Most times we buy a product that has been filtered through the designer's ears.

Fostex RAAL SEAS GOTO ALE GPA BMS Mundorf Eminence Tone Tubby JBL Fatail Pro 18 sound HI-VI Accuton fountek TAD Raven PHY
Lowther

Thanks for the clarification Jim... To start, decide on the total picture that you want to achieve. Do you want a full size or full range speaker. That typically requires a 3 way or more design. Do you want a smaller or stand mount. How much power do you have and how loud do you listen and how big is your room, will give you an idea of the type of sensitivity that you'll need to look for.
I will say, that in a 6 inch 2way, there are several diy designs that compete in the high end world available to order in kits. If you want an easier design, I'd look in that direction. Outside of that What type of music do you listen to, what type of sound are you after... For instance. Morel tweeters are smooth, easy to listen to, on extremely detailed equipment are very nice, but on most tend to be overly smooth and not detailed enough. Focal tweeters are very detailed and on the wrong equipment or crossover can sound quite edgey. Then there is Seas, Dyn Audio, Usher, Audax, ScanSpeak, HiVi, Raal, Vifa/Peerless, Hiquphon, SB,etc, etc, etc and that is just tweeters. One of the more well known diy'ers is Zaph. John's kits are resonance and impedance compensated, time aligned all fairly accurate... Might not be a bad place to start. If you want to do the whole kiboodle by yourself, Jeff Bagby has done some programing that is as good as 90% of what the pro's use... It was stated by someone earlier about predicted responses in programs. I have found that when I measured my own parts and accurately inputed info into Jeff's program that the predicted response was "Right On" with the finished product. I would find his free ware.
Good Luck, Tim

Edgecreek, after visualizing a room that would have to look like "Wild Animal Kingdom", in order for the "zebra wood" speakers to fit, I put that finish on hold.

Ngjockey,I like many of your ideas; Selah looks especially interesting, they could meet my requirements for the next speaker.

As Timlub pointed out, building speaker cabinets is no fun, and Selah has some beautiful speakers. Having input in regard to the final product is important. I could go there, audition drivers, and speak to the crossover designer in regard to "timbre"; that's important to me.

This takes a stretch of imagination, but if you look at the "music forum" as an "equipment forum", you will realize we all have very different needs and requirements. Since I've built speakers from scratch, I'm acutely aware of mine.

Although I want a speaker to fit my specification, I have no desire to build one; Selah could solve both problems.

I've been researching this for a while now, as I am going to build some next year. I am going to build single driver (aka no crossover), rear-loaded horn speakers, with a bass augmentor to fill out the bottom end (Curvy Chang). Check out http://www.frugal-horn.com for some amazing free designs.

The designs have a forum of people that have actually build them to help with process. There are several companies out there using these free designs to build and sell commercially, for a pretty penny I might add...and they get fantastic reviews.

Hope this helps in your process.
Mot